


testing the waters

by emi_rose, Waywardwitchcat



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angry Sex, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, consensual angry sex, eventual lup, postcanon, rage boner, they're angry but they're very much consenting, working through betrayals
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 14:08:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16064714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emi_rose/pseuds/emi_rose, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waywardwitchcat/pseuds/Waywardwitchcat
Summary: Sometimes you make overtures of reconciliation.Sometimes those turn into angry sex.Better luck next time.





	testing the waters

Barry J. Bluejeans was very good at putting his feelings into little boxes and squashing them down into tiny compartments. It made it easier to poke and prod at them to see where they came from and what he might do about them afterwards.

It did  _ not _ mean he was very good at ignoring them. 

Lup had said -- well, Lup had said a lot of things, and he loved her with his undying soul, but she did not and could not understand. But the true thing she had said was that regardless of how he wanted to deal with his grudge, there would be times he would need to set it aside in public, and if he wanted to have any sort of understanding with Lucretia about that, he would need to do it himself. She would do no mediating there. 

Which was right and he was an adult and so was Lucretia, Pan dammit, he could do this.

Which is totally why in a fit of spite, he opens a portal to her moon base and steps into her office in half reaper regalia (scythe, robe, and face).

"Hey, uh, Lucretia. Got a minute?"

Normally, she wouldn't be perturbed at all by someone arriving in her office unannounced. She's perfected the arched eyebrow, the gentle placement of her pen, the smooth transition to a meeting. Even the fact that he's opened a portal to her office isn't so much a surprise. After all, she knows quite a few of them now. It's hearing Barry's voice that gives her pause, makes her gasp before she can stop herself, causes her to drop her pen and splatter ink across whatever boring form she's busy filling out. 

Lucretia covers her mouth with an ink-stained hand an instant too late. "Barry? What are you doing here?"

Barry allows himself exactly one feeling of satisfaction that he’s scared her (he is the villain in her fiction, after all) before leaning casually against his scythe. Which is totally not because he wouldn’t know what to do with his hands otherwise. 

“Figured it was, uh, was about time we talked. Trying to, to get better about that sorta stuff.” 

He glances at the empty chair in front of her desk and raises an eyebrow at her.

Lucretia gives him a Look, one that she's worked on perfecting for years, and gestures to the seat. She's doing her best to project the image of control and cool confidence she usually wears in this office. She wonders if he sees through it.

"Well, since you're here. Let's talk. I'm sure you've brought a lot to discuss. Though -- is this, ah, official business?" She gestures at the scythe. "Because, if so, Lucas isn't here and I don't know anything about whatever he's done to get on your shit list this time."

She’d recovered her poise a lot faster than the Lucretia he remembered would have, and Barry files that away for reference. Depending on the memories of the people they used to be was something Lup tended to do too often- 

“What-? Oh, uh, nah.” He dismissed the scythe and cloak, leaving only his jeans and shirt.... which is black only after a lot of sarcasm from Kravitz. 

“Yeah, no, uuuh, s’the personal stuff. I guess you know we’ve been invited to the wedding?”

She maintains a veneer of composure, but her heart drops into her stomach. It doesn't come as a surprise, exactly, but being faced with the fact that she's going to have to see everyone she wronged at an ostensibly happy occasion is quite a different matter. 

"I suppose I do now. Are you here to ask my permission, which would be completely unnecessary?" As much as she tries not to think about it, the prospect of watching Lup and Barry dancing, absorbed in each other the way they always are, while she nurses a glass of wine alone in the corner makes her heart ache.

Barry sighs and pushes his hands through his hair, “No, Lucretia, I’m, fuck, I’m here to hash shit- to hash it out enough so we can be in the same public space and do more than avoid each other.” 

He gives her a heavily ironic look, “...you have enough of that already. And I’m not good at it.”

She looks at him, eyes hard, red-rimmed with exhaustion. "Not good at hashing shit out? Because believe me, I'm getting used to being ignored and avoiding you all. Whatever -- whatever we used to be doesn't need to come into play anymore." She takes a sip of the oversteeped cold tea on her desk and picks up her pen.

Barry's mouth tightens, but he doesn't rise to the bait. "We all fucked up, Luce, yours was just personal."

He leans forward, resting his arms on her desk, ignoring the crinkled papers under them.

"'Forgive and forget' doesn't, uh, doesn't really work here, but... I'd rather figure out if there's any moving forward instead."

He rubbed his forehead tiredly, "I'm real fuckin' sick of being angry, Luce."

Lucretia scoffs. She mirrors him, leans forward so her face is mere inches from his. She winces internally at the paperwork she's smearing under her elbows.  "It's not for me to decide, is it? I won't blame you if you decide to hate me forever, Bear." The affectionate nickname slips out before she can stop herself. She hopes he doesn't take note, doesn't see through her confident mask into the shy third wheel who fell in love with him and Lup many years and many worlds ago.

Barry rolls his eyes, pulling off his glasses, and pinching his nose,

"Yeah, see, that? That whole, uh, martyr thing you have going? You could at least own your shit, Lucy-Lu."

If pet names is how they're doing this, might as well break them all out.

Hearing him call her 'Lucy-Lu' out of the confines of whatever their relationship was (lovers felt too intimate, fuck-buddies or friends-with-benefits too crass….-did it even matter?) makes her stomach twist. "You don't think I own what I did?" she sneers. "You think I sleep well at night? You think you know me?"

"Gods, Lucretia, for fuck's sake- "

Barry scowls at her, veneer of calm faltering, "I did know you for a, uh, a fucking long time, and if I don't now, that's not  _ entirely _ up to me, now  _ is  _ it?"

Lucretia stands up and slams her hands on the desk.  She leans even closer. She knows she's getting under his skin. Where she wants to be. "You think you know me? Prove it."

"Yeah, that is the opposite of what I said, actually."

Taking a deep breath, Barry remains seated, deliberately not letting her escalate this, "Your. Plan. Worked. Luce. And mine didn't. And if, uh if you'd had the sense to talk to us about it, we might have been able to figure it out together, or! Maybe this was the only way we could have gotten here!"

He points at her desk, at the piles of paper that goes into running an organization like the Bureau, at all that came before that to make it work.

"And if that's the case, you fucked up a lot less than I did, and... and I just-"

Barry leans back, letting out another long breath, this one slightly tremulous.

"-You didn't even let me back after, Luce. You left me out there and never tried....never tried talking even then."

She glowers down at him. He's right, and it's one more mark on her record, one more gash in her soul, one more thing to repent for. "I abandoned you, I didn't trust you, I vilified you. What more is there to say?"   
Barry looks up at her, tiredly, watching her face. It’s sometimes easier to talk to her now that she’s not wearing the face he knew every inch of for a century. This one is sharper, last vestiges of baby fat magically aged away, high cheek bones pulled to points, stress lines turned into wrinkles on her forehead.    
  
They match a lot better now, he thinks, the mental age gap long since covered. Now it would be Lup who would look the outlier instead of him.    
  
“I don’t want your regret, Lucretia, I just want to, to know what it was I did that made you not trust me.”   


Lucretia sags. "All I've got for you is regret, but I seem to have plenty of that to go around, these days." She sits down heavily.  "I don't know what to say. It was my cross to bear, my white whale, what have you." She waves a hand lackadaisically.

He rolls his eyes, “You saved the universe, Lucretia, regret is, uh, is kinda selfish after that.”    
  
Bitterness rolls off his tongue, too late to pull back, and he’s not certain he wants to.

She doesn't meet his gaze. "Selfish, huh?" She scoffs. "Selfish would certainly cover it." The words taste hot and bitter on her tongue, and she wants to fling accusations, throw up her defenses, but something stays her hand.

Barry levels a steady gaze at her, running out of words, but unwilling to leave without something resolved. It's ridiculous, the way they keep sniping at each other. Not ridiculous in that there's no reason, but ridiculous that they got here.

Where did it happen?   
  
"You didn't answer my question."

Lucretia's long since run out of patience for angry reminders of her happy past showing up in her office demanding answers. He's taunting her, he must be. She leans over the table, way into Barry's personal space. "I. Don't. Owe. You. Answers," she bites out.

His eyes snap. There’s the briefest flicker of red lightning behind his eyes as he pushes himself out of the chair and shoves his face into hers,   
  
"The hell you don't! You took a hundred years of memory, ten years of life, and the knowledge of my  _ wife  _ away from me, Lucy. The very fucking least you could do is tell me why!"   
  
Breathing heavily, he brings up his left hand, slightly shaking; on his ring finger is a twisted red gold band set with a single opal, on his pinkie is a thin silver band with a design rubbed nearly away, but a small break on one side where it might pull apart.    
  
"Because I know if there's one thing you didn't do, it's  _ forget _ ."

Seeing that reminder of her time with Lup and Barry makes flashes of memories wick across her mind: the shopping district where they bought jewelry (three matching rings, a lovely set) and a million stupid tchotchkes lost to time, the evenings on the porch of the little house they rented, the days and nights spent lost in each other in bed. A sharp bolt of anger hits her in the gut, bringing with it an underlay of longing and grief that she doesn't want to acknowledge. 

There's a part of her that wants to slap him and another that wants to kiss him. She could give him the same answers she's been giving for months, the sentiments that run tangent to the truth: she couldn't stand to see them hurting, she was desperate and cornered, she needed to do something to keep this world from damnation, and yet. She vilified him, yes, and she loved him, she loved all of them, and seeing him weaponize her now hurts more than anything. 

They're close enough that Lucretia feels the heat rolling off his face, she makes an executive decision, and kisses him square on the mouth.

There's a cut off groan deep in Barry's throat as he brings up a hand to cup the back of her neck and pulls her closer to deepen the kiss; it's rough and needy and full of old wounds and longings and memories of happiness without any of the happiness itself.

They haven't kissed like this since, well, ever. She wants him, yes, but threaded through the anger and desire is a sharp pang of longing and melancholy. Lucretia flares her nostrils and takes his bottom lip in between her teeth. She only barely avoids drawing blood. She sweeps paperwork off her desk and plants her hands, pushing even closer to Barry. Her pulse hammers in her neck.

Barry hisses as she bites his lip, pulling away briefly to wrap his hands around her waist (bonier, hips jutting out from lack of meals) and lifting her bodily over the desk so he can press his thigh between her legs, leaning forward to bite down her neck.

She relishes the sharp pain emanating down her neck and groans as he pushes his thigh between her legs. She palms his cock and presses herself closer, arching into him and aching with want. "Fuck," she hisses. "Fuck you." She hates that he's asking for answers she doesn't want to give, hates her past self for being so myopic, hates that she wants him here and now.

Barry snorts, biting back another groan as she presses her palm against him, "Is that a statement or a question?"

His hands are still gripping her hips, fingers tight enough to bruise. It's so stupid, the memories flooding back, knowing what noises she'll make if he touches her here, touches her exactly right, wanting to touch every inch of her, wanting to leave her gasping and aching-

He pulls her head closer, more pressure on the back of her head, pressing his tongue into her mouth, not letting her pull away until he needs air.

Lucretia gasps when Barry breaks the kiss, heat surging through her chest. She hopes his fingers make bruises, she wants every mark to show and remind her when she looks in the mirror. "Statement," she says, and it's more breathy than sharp. She wants to make him say what he wants, but more than that, she wants him to fuck her, to throw her up against the wall and make her feel sorry for what she's done. She grabs him through his pants, less than gentle, and lets the wave of adrenaline course through her. She breathes hard and ragged, and reaches to fumble with the button of his jeans.

Barry can’t help the way his hips jerk into her hand, can’t help the way he reaches down to push her skirts up and back and above her waist.

“Fine,  _ fine- _ ”

He runs his hand over her underwear, pressing lightly, 

“But you  _ want _ this, Lucy-Lu?”

"You don't get to call me that anymore," she snaps, and part of her regrets it. But she  _ does _ want him, and pulls him closer with nails digging in to his shoulder, finally manages to undo his fly one-handed, takes him fully in her hand. "I want you to fuck me, and I don't want to talk about it," she says, and guides his cock to between her legs.

Barry breathes hard through his nose as he slides against the warmth of her, (t _ he only warm part left, _ says a thought from the back of his head that he summarily shoves away.) 

“Can’t have it all your  _ own _ way,  _ Lucretia _ ,” he growls and grabs her hand, trapping it in his own, sliding over her again. 

“Talking  _ and _ fucking, or no talking and no fucking.” 

His free hand reaches down to pull her panties aside, catching some of the wetness there already. 

“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how to do both.”

"Word choice, Barry," she hisses, and cants her hips towards him with a jerk. She's frantic, desperately pressing herself to him, eyes glinting and staring daggers into him.

“I know what I said,” it’s more of a murmur, as he runs his fingers shallowly along her, dipping just enough to make her hips twitch, circling her clit at too much of a distance.

“Never answered my question....”

She groans at his touch, takes him by the lapels, and pushes him towards the wall behind them. She's panting, struggling to get the words out. "If I...If I had new answers," she pushes him up against the wall, "I would have given them to you by now."

He stares at her, looking up at the two inches between them, biting off a moan as her thigh catches against his cock, 

“Didn’t- um, didn’t ask you why, I’ve heard that one.”

Reaching up, Barry cups her cheek, tenderly, a frank juxtaposition with his harsh tone.

“I asked, what did I do?”

She laughs, harshly, ruefully. She doesn't answer, just squeezes his cock between her thighs and kisses him hard, rutting against him.

Barry growls, frustrated, angry, wanting to shake her until the answers she won't give come flying out of her mouth.

Instead, he opens his mouth to deepen the kiss and wraps an arm around her waist, turning them sharply so she's now against the wall. His cock slides sharply against her, and he makes a quiet gasp, pulling back enough to run the fingers of his free hand along her folds and then in.

She's dizzy with desire and adrenaline and burning anger, and can't suppress a low groan when he pushes into her. She arches her head back and accentuates the way he rocks her into the wall.

It’s too easy to move two, then three fingers in, reaching up and crooking them against her g-spot, thumb pressing sharply against her clit, as he pants into her neck. 

Too easy to remember doing this a hundred other times on dozens of other worlds, when her skin was firmer, and her hair longer. He can’t pull it like he used to, but he reaches up to drag his fingers through the short curls anyway, 

“You close?”

Lucretia scrabbles at his back for purchase on his shirt. "Fuck...you," she grinds out from between gritted teeth. She's very close, and she knows he's well aware of it. She presses her clit on his hand, desperate for more.

Barry hums with a slight shake of his head, “thought so....” he lets her press on his thumb, his fingers still pumping as her breath pitches higher, catches....

He pulls his fingers out, thumb flicking up to move her hand away. 

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Hey, fuck, Bear,” she pants, hips pushing into his palm, seeking purchase. She grabs his ass and tries to pull him close.

"Lucy-" Barry pins her, thigh going between her legs again, but not at an angle she can easily grind, 

"I really don't see you doing anything here to encourage me to help you out." he manages a tsking noise, running his hand up her neck to grip her hair.

" _ Barry _ ," she says, sharper, growing more desperate. She arches her head back. Her hand moves from his ass to his cock, stroking him in quick, jerky movements, taunting him. She slides her thumb over the head of his cock and squeezes.

Barry chokes off, hips thrusting up into her hand, and he growls before biting down on her collarbone, 

“Godsdamned stubborn-“

Lucretia leans into the sharp pain where he bites down, blossoming into warm pleasurable heat deep in her chest. She pushes him between her thighs. "You want to see stubborn?"

"Yeah, yeah, you're tops at that," Barry mutters, gripping her thigh and yanking her leg up. His other hand on the small of her back helps her balance as he slides into her in one motion, not bothering to hide the long sigh of relief.

"Gods, fuck.....Lucy, I missed this. You can't stop me missing this anymore."

She's not quite as flexible as she used to be, and there's a pleasant burn in her thigh from the stretch. She wraps her leg around him and pulls him closer. "What, you missed fucking a traitor?" she whispers, strained, nails sharp on his back.

Barry moves his hand up from her back to her head, twining his fingers in Lucretia’s short hair, reveling at the feeling before yanking sharply.

“None of that. I told you, not gonna, gonna have it all your own way.” 

He thrusts up into her, fingers gripped bruisingly hard on her thigh.

Lucretia leans her back against the wall and snaps her hips against him, pushing past his hands to grab his ass. "Then neither will you," she growls in his ear, biting at his pulse point, harder than she used to.

Barry hisses, yanking her hair again, thrusting his hips against hers.

“Just need my question answered, Lucy-Lu, not here to listen to you call yourself names.” 

It’s an awkward angle, but he’s had plenty of experience in his extended life, and he falls into rhythm: slow but hard, snapping his hips up to hear her breath catch.

She hates him for the way he calls her by that old pet name, hates him for asking the questions she's been asking, hates herself for enjoying the way he feels inside her. She sneers at him. "Would you rather do the name calling?"

“Bitter doesn’t look good on you, Lucy,” Barry grits out, fingers tightening on her hair, on her hips. 

He could bite out all the names and accusations he used when cursing her name in his cave, the cave that was as close to home as he could get for the ten years that she stole his real one away.

He could throw them in her face and her mouth would twist as she absorbed them, considered it what she deserved. He could finish here, spit those names in her face, and leave, anger churned back into acid bile in his stomach, and they would see each other later and she would glance away, face red with.... shame? Anger? 

And she still wouldn’t have answered his question. 

“Only one thing I’d rather happen here, Lucretia.” 

Barry snapped his hips again, hand dropping from her hair to between them, fingers pressing along her clit in time to his thrusts.

Whatever she was going to say is lost for a moment in the throaty moan that falls from her lips. "Take what you came here for, and leave," she pants out. "Say what you came here to say. Coward." If she knows him at all - and she's not at all sure she does anymore - there's something he's keeping to himself.

Barry leans forward, trailing kisses along her collarbone, rolling his hips rather than snapping them.

"I came here to say I missed you, I wanted to know what happened, I wanted to move on, Lucretia."

His grip tightens on her thigh again, as he stares up into her face,

"Do you know how to do that?"

She doesn't answer right away, just urges him to quicken the pace, pushing herself to the climax she feels building. "This. Is. Not. The. Time," she says, punctuating every word with her body.

"When. Lucy." The inclination pull his fingers away to feel her shudder with a ruined climax again is  _ there  _ but would mean stopping his hips rolling into hers, and Barry is just not about that life right now.

His fingers press down harder, hooking as they massage at her clit, thrusting harder into her. 

"After you come? I can do that, sure...."

"You better not make me wait." Lucretia reaches for his face and smacks his glasses away.

Barry does scowl at that, "Fuck off, those are prescription-"

It's barely a token protest, he presses down, thrusts again, and leans forward to bite at a forming bruise on her neck.

"Mend them later," Lucretia says, voice completely wrecked. She grabs his wrists and pulls them towards her, slamming his hands up against the wall. She rocks him against her, accelerating the pace, and her orgasm builds and crests and whites out her vision for a blissful shuddering moment.

"Fuck-FUCK-" Barry slams into her, vision blurring as he comes, hands resting on either side of her face. "Fucking-"

He reaches up and kisses her harshly, biting Lucretia's lower lip and panting.

She tastes blood and pushes him away, forcing him to stumble back. She stalks to her desk and wraps her jacket around her shoulders protectively. "Get the fuck out of my office," she snarls.

Barry regains his balance, panting and staring at her. Slowly, he brushes his hair back, holding out another hand so his bent but not broken glasses can fly into them. 

Still not looking away from her, he conjures his scythe and slices a hole in the air between them. 

“Good to see you too, Lucy-Lu.” 

He steps forward and is gone.


End file.
